A tentative settlement has been reached in the long-running dispute over the work of amateur street photographer Vivian Maier, the reclusive Chicago nanny who rocketed to posthumous fame after tens of thousands of her undeveloped photographs were found in an old storage locker.

The agreement, revealed in a filing in Cook County Probate Court and first reported by the Tribune, signals a potential end to a stalemate that began nearly two years ago when the county's public administrator took over Maier's estate, including the publishing rights to a collection that's been heralded as some of the most stunning street photography of the 20th century.

A motion to approve the settlement will be presented before Probate Judge Mary Ellen Coghlan on May 10, court records show. The motion was filed under seal for reasons that were not explained, and no details of the proposed agreement have been made public.

John Maloof, who owns more than 90 percent of Maier's negatives, told the Tribune he had yet to sign the final agreement but was encouraged by the recent direction of negotiations with the county.

Maloof said he was hopeful the settlement would "allow everybody to move forward" with projects that have been on hold since the legal dispute erupted in June 2014.

"My hope is we won't have to be afraid of the unknown anymore," he said.

If the agreement is finalized, Maloof said, he will begin developing hundreds of rolls of 35 mm color film that Maier shot later in her life — tens of thousands of photographs that have never been seen by anyone, including Maier herself.

"Who knows what's on them?" Maloof said.

Leah Jakubowski, the general counsel for Public Administrator David Epstein, said Tuesday the settlement was "good for both the estate and Mr. Maloof" and would "allow him to continue his work" printing and exhibiting Maier's work. Jakubowski would not disclose the terms of the agreement or say whether it would be unsealed if it's approved by the judge.

Chris Walker / Chicago Tribune

David Riley, right, from Greensboro, N.C., views photos by street photographer Vivian Maier in the exhibit, "Vivian Maier's Chicago" at the Chicago History Museum on Sept. 8, 2014.

David Riley, right, from Greensboro, N.C., views photos by street photographer Vivian Maier in the exhibit, "Vivian Maier's Chicago" at the Chicago History Museum on Sept. 8, 2014.

(Chris Walker / Chicago Tribune)

For much of her life, Maier lived and worked as a nanny in Chicago's well-to-do northern suburbs, snapping thousands of photographs of street life in Chicago while taking the children in her care on shopping trips and other expeditions. She also took photos on her trips in the U.S. and abroad.

She left no will when she died at 83, and her intimate work remained a secret until Maloof and others inspected the negatives and undeveloped rolls of film they had bought at an auction of old storage locker items shortly before her death.

Maier's work — and her fascinating backstory — took the art world by storm when Maloof began posting the photographs online in 2009. Soon, Maier's photographs were being shown in art exhibits and galleries around the world. Several books have been written about her work and life. Maloof co-produced a documentary about his experience, "Finding Vivian Maier," that was nominated for an Oscar in 2015.

The public fascination with Maier led professional genealogists and amateur sleuths alike to pore through early-1900s census records for clues and to travel to remote mountain villages in southeast France looking for distant cousins in Maier's family tree.

Meanwhile, debate has raged in art circles, where some viewed those publishing Maier's work as profiteers who circumvented well-established copyright law and manipulated Maier's story for their own gain.

The probate case that has played out in Chicago has added another layer of intrigue to Maier's story. At the center of the case is an unusual situation: A woman who died virtually penniless and without any clear heirs now has an estate potentially worth millions of dollars. But while the estate has the copyrights to Maier's work, others legally own the film itself.

The proceedings were put in motion last summer by David Deal, a Virginia copyright attorney and former professional photographer who says his fascination with Maier's work sparked concerns that those selling her images were violating copyright law.

Deal had read Maloof's story of how he had hired genealogists to trace Maier's roots in France and found a first cousin once removed, Sylvain Jaussaud, who accepted $5,000 in exchange for giving up the rights to market Maier's work. Deal took it upon himself to track down another man in southeast France who is also believed to be Maier's first cousin once removed.

In 2014, he filed a petition in Cook County on behalf of the man, Francis Baille, asking the court to name Baille as an heir to the estate. Weeks later, the public administrator's office took over, putting the question of heirship back at square one.

Last summer, it was revealed that Maier's long-lost brother, Charles, who would've been Maier's closest heir, died years ago in a New Jersey mental hospital and never had children.

The uncertainty surrounding the litigation caused several exhibits of Maier's work to be taken down and prompted Rogers Park neighborhood artist Jeffrey Goldstein to abruptly sell his 17,500 black-and-white Maier negatives to Canadian gallery owner Stephen Bulger. An exhibition of about 50 prints from Goldstein's collection — some of which have never been seen before — is scheduled for display at Bulger's Toronto gallery in June.

Meanwhile, the county's negotiations with Maloof have been complicated and dragged on for more than a year and a half.

Under one proposal reported by the Tribune in 2015, the county offered to set up a foundation for Maier's work that would give it control of the tens of thousands of negatives and prints purchased at auction shortly before her death. Other ideas included letting the sale of her works continue but putting the lion's share of any profits back into the estate.

Whatever arrangement was struck, the question of who might be the rightful heir to Maier's estate continues, Deal told the Tribune on Tuesday in a telephone interview. Deal said he spoke with the public administrator this week and remains in regular contact with Baille in case he's ever named an heir.

Deal said he still believes that Maloof violated the law by profiting from Maier's work without first obtaining the copyrights. But he acknowledged the circumstances in Maier's case are "one in a million" and that following the letter of the law could have meant that Maier's photographs remained hidden — a worst-case scenario for everyone.

"Hopefully, this means people can start to enjoy Vivian Maier's work again without things being tied up in court," Deal said.

A version of this article appeared in print on May 04, 2016, in the News section of the Chicago Tribune with the headline "Development may end fight over Vivian Maier's photos" —
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